


Tie A Ribbon Around My Heart

by AndreaLyn



Category: Tin Man (2007)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-05
Updated: 2014-10-05
Packaged: 2018-02-19 23:58:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2407661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AndreaLyn/pseuds/AndreaLyn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's a sea of love letters, boxes of chocolates, and some subtle (or obvious, depending who you ask) flirting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tie A Ribbon Around My Heart

“Glitch has  _entirely_  too much stuff,” DG announced, wiping her brow as she dumped yet another box of papers onto the ground. Around her stood Cain and Raw, who she had contracted to help with the seemingly endless mission of cleaning out Glitch’s old lab to move him to a nice new one with windows and all.  
  
At first, she had thought to do it herself, as a favour to Glitch. After two days of heavy lifting, she’d been immediately pleading with Raw and Cain.  
  
Cain had been the last to enter the new room, carrying two boxes at once, as if trying to prove something. “You’re telling me,” he grunted out, dropping the thick cardboard boxes and sitting down on top of one as he fanned his face with his hat. “Wonder how much of that is actually useful.”  
  
“It’s probably Ambrose’s, from before…” DG said, trailing off.   
  
“Yeah, well, if Glitch keeps a quarter of the paperwork as his genius half, then everyone’s in luck,” Cain muttered, looking enviously at the glass of water Raw was drinking from. “How about sharing?”  
  
“Cain get own,” Raw said, in the middle of gulping it down.   
  
Cain rolled his eyes and leaned his neck forward to stretch out the muscles there while trying desperately not to think about DG’s upcoming ‘Valentine’s Day Gala’ about some guy who got murdered and apparently people thought that was romantic or something. He was also not looking forward to the rest of the boxes in the lab.  
  
“Um. Hey guys?”   
  
Cain and Raw turned to look at DG at exactly the same time.  
  
“I found love letters,” she said, gaping at the heavily-stained sheets in her hands. “Oh my god,” she mumbled, reading them rapidly before shoving them at Cain.  
  
“This seems like an invasion of his privacy, kid,” Cain said warily.  
  
“So? It’s…the season for love and sharing and friendship, or whatever,” DG insisted, waving one hand dismissively. “Besides, they’re probably ancient. From Ambrose’s school days and he probably doesn’t… _wow_ …remember them. He must have really had it for this person. Maybe it was that Leona girl he talks about?” Cain glanced up and took the letter from DG, knowing that she was probably overreacting just to get his attention.  
  
“My dearest,” Cain read aloud, “It’s a silly greeting, I’m aware, but starting with your name seems too simple and you deserve so much more than that. You deserve every incredible word in the world devoted to you. So bear with me while I call you love and dearest and darling on paper and I promise I’ll never say the words aloud.” Cain’s reading of the letter left a lot of the romance to the imagination, given his incredulous tone. “I spend most of my waking hours thinking of your delicate skin, of your radiant eyes. How other people don’t stop to stare is beyond me.”  
  
DG snatched the letter right out of Cain’s hands to read it herself.   
  
“Come on, we’ve got a lot more boxes to move and that sap can wait for later. Whoever she is he’s writing to might not even be alive now.” It still took an effort to not say ‘after Azkadellia’s reign’, something DG literally frowned on with every mention.   
  
“You can go ahead, Mr. Cain,” DG said distractedly as Raw craned his head to the side. “We’re gonna read here.”  
  
Great. Not only were they reading love tripe, but now Cain was doing all the heavy lifting by himself.   
  
*  
  
Cain made his way back to Glitch’s lab without much eagerness, slowly rounding the door and giving a casual nod to Glitch, in the corner. “You here to help or just to watch and taunt?”  
  
“I think more of the second, but you never know when my brain will decide it’s the other way around,” Glitch said with a wide grin on his lips. “Actually, I think I came here looking for something. Have you seen it?”  
  
“You’re going to have to be a lot more specific than ‘it’, Glitch,” Cain said apologetically. He started to pile up small bundles in his arms while keeping an eye out for anything that Glitch could’ve been looking for. “So, you indulging DG in this Valen-crap or whatever she’s calling it?”  
  
“Valentine. It’s actually very interesting,” Glitch mused thoughtfully, picking through papers idly. “Apparently, it’s all based on a man called Saint Valentine, who united people in love even though it was against the law. I like the message, even if the mode of showing affection is shiny glitter and cards and chocolates. I do like chocolate part a  _lot_  though.”  
  
“Remind me the next time I go into Central. They used to have a nice little candy shop when I was a Tin Man,” Cain was speaking distractedly, wondering if the old place was still around. “Might even feed you a couple of them if you’re good.”  
  
“If I’m good?” Glitch smirked at him, giving a playful ‘rowr’. “Cain, if I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were flirting.”  
  
“Well, how am I doing?”  
  
“Eight points for style, seven for technique. It’s a little bumpy, considering it’s come out of nowhere.”  
  
Cain had papers piled high to his chin, but that did nothing to lessen the effect of the Look that Cain was giving to his half-brained friend. “Sweetheart wasn’t a hint?” he asked, completely calm. “Dancing with you at the Queen’s big bash wasn’t a hint? That time I groped you in the…”  
  
“I thought you tripped.”  
  
“And my hand just happened to grab your ass, of all things?” Cain replied, bemused. He shifted, ambling to get out the door without tripped on anything. “Can you get the door?” he asked, grateful when Glitch hopped, skipped, and jumped his way forward to help. “Hey, Glitch,” Cain started curiously. “Are you a romantic?”  
  
“In what sense of the word?”  
  
“You know, fancy letters to girls and all. Flowers, big gestures.”  
  
“Oh. I think I used to be,” Glitch admitted, rubbing a hand several inches above his head (not actually touching his hair). “There may have been a flower or two, yes.”  
  
“Good to know.”   
  
And it was. It was at least good to know that Glitch (or Ambrose, whoever) had been responsible for all those boxes of love letters that DG was probably knee-deep in. He climbed the stairs to get to the new lab to find DG on her stomach, splayed amongst papers.   
  
“Cain, oh my god, Cain,” DG blurted out when she saw him, ridiculously excited considering she hadn’t been doing anything but _reading_. She nearly vaulted to her feet, flicking a letter in his face, that same horrible smile on her face, like she’d gone and inhaled some kind of toxin that made her do nothing but laugh. “They’re not about some woman from his past.  _Look_  at this part about ‘broad chest’ and ‘strong arms’.”  
  
Cain just raised an impassive brow, as if trying too hard to not care.  
  
DG kept looking eagerly at him.  
  
So eventually, he folded and took the letters into his hands. “Give me those,” he muttered. “I’ll be in my room. Don’t disturb me unless the Queen wants me on the gallows for being late to the ball.”  
  
*  
  
Hours later, Cain was stumbling out of his room with sore eyes as he made his way down to the ballroom in wrinkled-finest, knowing that he probably was more than late and had been because of dozens of romantic letters that Ambrose had written in the peak of his youth.   
  
The letters had flowed over with graceful strokes of ink describing beautiful eyes, the careful grace of long fingers, and then had gone on to wax poetical with a bunch of crap about ‘inner strength’ being more beautiful than the outer casing, which according to the letters, wasn’t half bad.   
  
Cain wasn’t sure he liked the feelings going through him, pretty sure that it was  _jealousy_ , even if it was all in the past, judging by the musty smell to the letters.   
  
Cain tugged at his stiff collar as he snuck into the kitchen entrance to the ballroom, acting as if he had been there the whole time. It looked like a fairly slow evening, which Cain immediately cursed. If everything had been quick, he could have just snuck in and pretended nothing was amiss.  
  
“Cain, you’re late,” Glitch said in that wry tone he had. “Did you get lost?”  
  
“Yeah,” Cain retorted, sarcasm thick in his tone. “Tripped with one of your heavy boxes and got stuck under all the ego.”  
  
“You know, it’s a nasty habit you’re developing of using humour to defend yourself,” Glitch observed curiously, pulling Cain out of the way of a careening couple bent on dancing their way all around the room, even though the dance floor had ended many a foot ago. “It’s probably in defense of some sore spot you have, but I guess we can forgive you…”  
  
“You were in love,” Cain interrupted, wanting it off the tip of his tongue, given that Glitch’s hand was curling around his wrist with soft fingers that refused to let go. In fact, when Cain accused him of that, they almost brushed affectionately. “You wrote dozens of letters, I could have sworn I counted sixty.”  
  
“You found my letters?” Glitch said with immediate alarm, shoving his hands into his pockets, as if Cain had spooked him. Cain knew he probably shouldn’t have said anything, given the fact that he might not remember this conversation in a few minutes. But then, that was the same reason to go ahead and have this conversation. If Glitch didn’t remember it, then Cain would get a second chance.   
  
“You had it pretty bad,” Cain observed amiably, able to talk about it because it was in the past and because no big-chested, smooth-handed man had come waltzing into the palace to declare his intentions for Glitch. Then, if any man did do that, Cain might just find it in him to draw out his gun and angle it in the man’s direction.  
  
“Can we please talk about something else? Like this holiday!” Glitch said enthusiastically. “I believe there was a promise about chocolates and feeding.”  
  
“Yeah, down in…”  
  
“Central City,” Glitch interrupted to say the words along with Cain. “Oh, those,” he said casually. “I had them delivered so you could just feed me in the comfort of your room. Which is an offer, yes,” he anticipated Cain’s question. “So?”  
  
“Why do I have the feeling that you had this planned?” Cain asked slowly.  
  
“Possibly because even with half a brain, I’m occasionally smarter than you could ever be,” Glitch suggested with that hint of ego that the rest of them always got to see once in a while, to know that Ambrose had never really vanished, not  _really_. “Well, come on. I had the chocolates brought to your room the minute you left. I believe the spirit of this holiday is chocolates and cards.”  
  
“That doesn’t sound like something a church would celebrate.”  
  
“DG says it’s Hallmark,” Glitch mused, taking the lead. “I’m not sure what she meant, exactly.”  
  
“As far as I’m concerned, it’s all Othersider crap,” Cain admitted, watching the way Glitch seemed to drift down the halls from left to right and feeling like he’d forgotten something. “You go on ahead, I’m going to get a couple of things,” he said impulsively, out of some spur of the moment desire to make the night memorable. Maybe it was just tripe, but it was an excuse for Cain to do something right and something  _good_. There weren’t enough nights like those out there, as far as he was concerned.   
  
He made his way to the room with a bottle of sparkling wine, glasses, and some red ties draped over his wrists, the likes of which Adora liked to put in her hair. It caused Cain a moment’s pause, but he managed to overcome it with the quiet thought that wherever Adora was, it was a good place. She’d earned that much.   
  
When he got back to the room, he opened the door to find Glitch studying all the letters that Cain had been reading, plucking them out one by one from the box.   
  
“You remembering anything?” Cain asked carefully, hoping to not disturb a thought process.   
  
“Not hard to remember too much when ooh, what are those!” Glitch announced eagerly, catching sight of the things in Cain’s hands.   
  
Cain just offered a bemused and settled smile as he poured the wine. “Promise you won’t go getting so drunk that you’ll be sick,” he warned, but handed the glass off to Glitch without waiting to hear the promise in return. He took a long sip of the liquid himself, letting it heat up his stomach and give him a little courage while twisting the silk red tie in his hands, back and forth.  
  
Glitch looked to be ready to open his mouth and speak again, but Cain had other plans.   
  
He had gotten a good hold on the tie with both hands and rose them above Glitch’s hand, letting the silk rest on the nape of Glitch’s neck and pull him closer as Cain stepped in to kiss him and leave absolutely no uncertainty that this was more than a little bit of flirting. The red ribbon caught the soft glow of candlelight in Cain’s room (a little feature that Glitch had been busy with, it seemed) and Cain let it rub softly back and forth against the pale skin of Glitch’s neck as he parted his lips.  
  
His upper lip brushed against Glitch’s lower one as he leaned in slowly, pressing their bodies together and stealing a long-desired kiss from his companion’s lips, all forms of heat and sweetness from the wine.   
  
Slowly, Cain eased himself away, no more distance than was absolutely necessary so he could look at Glitch’s eyes and the way they didn’t open fully.  
  
“Happy Valentine’s whatever, Glitch,” he offered in a low tone, the warmth of his words curling around the next kiss that Cain pressed to the corner of Glitch’s lips. Finally, he released the silk tie and wandered over to indulge in more of the wine and the way it went straight to his head, made him think that his slowly-growing heart was increasing in size faster than ever.  
  
“Cain,” Glitch called over, picking up the letters one by one again.  
  
“Yeah, Glitch?”  
  
“I’m just curious…”  
  
“Seems like you never stop being curious,” Cain noted wryly. He polished off the glass of wine and set it on the table while making strides towards Glitch, wrapping his arms around the other man’s waist to forcibly grasp his hips and twirl them both towards the bed. “How about you start being something else?”  
  
Glitch let Cain tug him down onto the bed – Cain first, then Glitch in his lap – before Cain got them more comfortable in the straddled position.  
  
“I don’t…” Cain kissed Glitch’s lips, reaching over to press a chocolate to the swollen and pink parts of Glitch’s mouth. “Mmfgh, that’s not to say I don’t…” Another chocolate, this one filled with caramel that dripped to Glitch’s chin and  _forced_  Cain to lick it up, more was the pity. “Cain! I need to tell you something about those letters!” Glitch protested, sounding flustered.   
  
He looked it too, considering the colour of his cheeks, the half-lidded way his eyes were set on Cain’s lips, and the way he was actually sucking chocolate off Cain’s fingers lent itself to the notion that maybe Cain was getting to Glitch. Maybe just a  _little_.   
  
Cain slowly pried his finger from Glitch’s mouth.  
  
“I don’t care about the letters, sweetheart, it’s in the past,” he assured, guiding Glitch’s legs into a comfortable straddle.  
  
“That’s just it, Cain,” Glitch pointed out. “If you had half of a half of a brain, you’d see that they’re  _not_  from the past.” Cain narrowed his eyes, wondering what all this was about and if he was actually in need of threatening some oaf away. “They’re about you! I’ve been writing them to you since the Witch was defeated, but I never got the courage to send them, so I stuffed them all in a big box marked ‘Tin Strategies’,” he explained, his cheeks no less pink than they were minutes ago. “So.”  
  
“You wrote those things about me?”  
  
“If you’re happy about it, yes. If you’re mad, then no, absolutely not, it was a f-frame job,” Glitch stammered out anxiously.   
  
Cain’s smile turned into a full-on grin as he finally tugged Glitch down until they were both horizontal on the bed, their clothes haggard, the wine beside them, and maybe a chocolate graced the floor in the mad dash for their new positions. Cain wasn’t mad in the least and Glitch could probably tell from the warmth in his eyes and the grin on his lips.  
  
“I have smooth, fine hands?” Cain wondered.  
  
“Well, maybe in the light of day.”  
  
“And my lips remind you of soft pink petals?”  
  
“Cain,” Glitch was beginning to whine in a dangerous growl.  
  
“What about the part where my thighs give you heart palpit…”  
  
“Would you go back to seducing me already, for gods’ sake!” Glitch demanded, taking the tie and pressing it firmly against Cain’s lips so that words would come out in a muffled tone. Cain hadn’t expected that, but he also didn’t expect the stirrings down lower at being half-gagged like that.  
  
By the look on Glitch’s face, he was also figuring out that the silk tie could serve much more interesting purposes.   
  
“Write me a letter in the morning,” Cain mumbled from behind the tie. “And I’ll go back to what I was doing.”  
  
“You got a deal, sweetheart,” Glitch promised, using Cain’s nickname for the headcase with great delight and diving down to resume the trail of kisses and touches to mark DG’s imported holiday.  
  
THE END


End file.
